The First Day of School
Perfekt Boy
It’s the first day of school for most of our kids on Tuesday. All of the kids go to a great, truly remarkably school called Grace St. Luke’s here in Memphis. One of the kids has moved on to another school now, but GSL has shaped so much of our lives and the kids’ lives.
It’s a sweet, smart, deeply goofy, nicely imperfect-in-a-very-genuinely-human-way-sort-of-way place. I can’t ever thank the people there enough.
Because it’s about to be the first day of school, some friends of ours who have a child much younger than our kids were invited to a pre-school parent party for new parents this weekend. Somehow they mentioned this to me during what was, for me, a moment of clarity. They’re new parents, with their first child, a son, just days away from entering this new phase of his — and their — life.
And so, based on many years at GSL and many nights and days at new parent parties, I sent them these suggestions on how best to act at the new parent party.
1. Always get drunk before you go, preferably in a smoky bar so that you can arrive smelling like cigarettes and Tequila. A bar with many smokers of clove cigarettes is, always, a plus.
2. Talk loudly about how exceptionally great your child is and how much smarter and nicer and stronger he has always been than all the other kids in the Montessori program he’s attended since he was 8 weeks old.
3. Make just enough jokes about your kid getting a free ride courtesy of the headmaster to make people question whether, in fact, you did get a free ride courtesy of the headmaster, at which point you should proclaim loudly that, of course, your child didn’t get a free ride courtesy of the headmaster. Then be oddly quiet for a full 30 minutes.
4. Complain about the vegetable platters “which were probably picked up in the discount aisle of the grocery store or something, I mean really, can you eat this?”
5. Tell the host their house is nice and everything but you’ve been walking around and you really are realizing how nice your own house is and how you’ve decided, tonight, that you really don’t need or want to sell your house. (Details on differences should be ad-libbed in context, with a special emphasis on paint colors, kitchen counters and bathroom lighting.)
6. [Can't be repeated publicly. Sorry. But you'll thank me some day.]
7. Emphasize your child’s many food allergies, even if he doesn’t have any.
8. Start a loud, confident, deeply self-assured monologue about how “teaching preschool” is pretty much “just babysitting” and how your child is “probably able to teach this class himself” because he already knows his colors and is “real good with adding.” This will absolutely, positively endear you (and your family and most of all your child) to all the teachers.
9. Bring your child to the party, even though children weren’t invited. And then have him start counting to 50. In French. Then, when it’s late and he gets cranky, demand that the host put a movie on for him.
10. Talk trash about Eric Carle. “I mean, it’s not like there’s much of a vocabulary to the books. And the pictures, I mean, I could draw those pictures. God knows my son could. I mean, he’s already an artist.”
Enjoy your first day.
